Friday, January 7

 

The rains have arrived in Tasmania at last.  It’s been threatening for a few days and now it has started.  Jamie rang a little while ago to check that we are still alive and suggested it was a good day to spend indoors.  What does he think we do every day?  We don’t have many reasons to go out any more and within these four walls is our normal environment.

 

I watched the TV news this morning as I normally do and am as bemused as everyone else with the nonsense surrounding Novak Djokevic. Is he kidding?  Does he really think he is so important he can ignore the law?  I have no tolerance for people who are so full of themselves, they think they can do what they like.  No matter what the outcome of the ‘investigation’, he should be told to go back to where he came from and forget about playing tennis here.

 

I caught one off-hand comment made by a reporter that Djokevic is sharing the hotel with refugees, some of whom have been in detention there for over 8 years.  Are we mad?  Australian fruit growers are desperate for workers to get their crop off the trees and vines and into the markets and around Australia we have a cohort of able-bodied, motivated potential workers who are being forced to vegetate in tiny hotel rooms with no hope of a better future.  How much is this costing the Australian taxpayer?

 

One of the farms just up the road from us has a workers village built with proper accommodation, kitchen area, meeting rooms, etc and it is nearly empty.  When I spoke to the farmer during the census he told me he has trouble getting workers and would be delighted to have more.

 

Surely, it’s not beyond our capacity to move these stranded refugees out of the cities into country areas where they could be accommodated in towns or on farms, work for their keep and contribute to our economy.  We could dangle a carrot: work for x years and then apply for citizenship.  We might lose a few who don’t want to work but we know that most of the asylum seekers are here looking for a better life.  It’s a resource our government doesn’t seem to have the wit to utilise.